Twinkle, Twinkle Christmas Star

Here is a tactile and meaningful way to share a Christmas activity with your young English learners. Children from
as young as 9 months will have fun discovering all these new objects.

Before singing

I introduced this activity with some babies and toddlers accompanied by their Assistantes Maternelles
(child-minders) this week. I introduced the session by hiding a shiny star in the room which we then discovered together "Wow! Look! There's something twinkling over there!
Look" They all had a chance to touch and hold the star before I introduced a bare Christmas tree. Even this was interesting for the children who pulled and touched
the branches "A Christmas Tree, a small Christmas Tree. Yes, that's a branch. It's rough isn't it? Yes, let's put the star at the top of the tree"

Singing

{Hold hands up about shoulder height. Open and close hands} How I wonder what you are.

{Raise shoulders and hold hands out} Up above the tree so high,

{Raise hands high in the sky and open and close them
again} Like a diamond in the sky.

{Form forefinger and thumb from each hand in a diamond shape} Twinkle, twinkle Christmas Star,

{Hold hands up about shoulder height. Open and close hands}How I wonder what you are.

{Raise shoulders and hold hands out}

I sang the song a few times alone to give everyone an idea of what to sing and the adults joined in when they were ready. I
then handed out a little song sheet with the lyrics. We repeated the lullaby quite a few times together to enable all adults to feel confident singing in English. I then gradually
introduced the actions.

After Singing

I then introduced the sensory bin. I used a large, under the bed, plastic storage box containing coloured red rice, clear
and red glass nuggets and various things to decorate the tree; small red baubles, ribbon, sparkly pipe cleaners, pom poms and a toy star. I put the tree inside and we
let them play. Two little girls got stuck right in and started decorating the tree without any prompts from us adults. As they put the decorations on the tree I talked about what they were
doing "The tinsel. Oh, I can see that your're wrapping it around the tree! Beautiful. You want the bauble at the top? That one is so shiny. I repeated the words Christmas
Tree, bauble, star and tinsel and the adjectives shiny and dull. They told us all about it too "tinsel",
"baubles", "star".

We finished up with one beautiful tree and some very proud children (and adults)